Murder in Mesopotamia

I hurried in. Miss Johnson was lying in bed, her whole body contorted in agony. As I set down the candle and bent over her, her lips moved and she tried to speak – but only an awful hoarse whisper came. I saw that the corners of her mouth and the skin of her chin were burnt a kind of greyish white.

Her eyes went from me to a glass that lay on the floor evidently where it had dropped from her hand. The light rug was stained a bright red where it had fallen. I picked it up and ran a finger over the inside, drawing back my hand with a sharp exclamation. Then I examined the inside of the poor woman’s mouth.

There wasn’t the least doubt what was the matter. Somehow or other, intentionally or otherwise, she’d swallowed a quantity of corrosive acid – oxalic or hydrochloric, I suspected.

I ran out and called to Dr Leidner and he woke the others, and we worked over her for all we were worth, but all the time I had an awful feeling it was no good. We tried a strong solution of carbonate of soda – and followed it with olive oil. To ease the pain I gave her a hypodermic of morphine sulphate.

David Emmott had gone off to Hassanieh to fetch Dr Reilly, but before he came it was over.

I won’t dwell on the details. Poisoning by a strong solution of hydrochloric acid (which is what it proved to be) is one of the most painful deaths possible.

It was when I was bending over her to give her the morphia that she made one ghastly effort to speak. It was only a horrible strangled whisper when it came.

‘The window…’ she said. ‘Nurse…the window…’

But that was all – she couldn’t go on. She collapsed completely.

I shall never forget that night. The arrival of Dr Reilly. The arrival of Captain Maitland. And finally with the dawn, Hercule Poirot.

He it was who took me gently by the arm and steered me into the dining-room, where he made me sit down and have a cup of good strong tea.

‘There, mon enfant,’ he said, ‘that is better. You are worn out.’

Upon that, I burst into tears.

‘It’s too awful,’ I sobbed. ‘It’s been like a nightmare. Such awful suffering. And her eyes…Oh, M. Poirot – her eyes…’

He patted me on the shoulder. A woman couldn’t have been kinder.

‘Yes, yes – do not think of it. You did all you could.’

‘It was one of the corrosive acids.’

‘It was a strong solution of hydrochloric acid.’

‘The stuff they use on the pots?’

‘Yes. Miss Johnson probably drank it off before she was fully awake. That is – unless she took it on purpose.’

‘Oh, M. Poirot, what an awful idea!’

‘It is a possibility, after all. What do you think?’

I considered for a moment and then shook my head decisively.

‘I don’t believe it. No, I don’t believe it for a moment.’ I hesitated and then said, ‘I think she found out something yesterday afternoon.’

‘What is that you say? She found out something?’

I repeated to him the curious conversation we had had together.

Poirot gave a low soft whistle.

‘La pauvre femme!’ he said. ‘She said she wanted to think it over – eh? That is what signed her death warrant. If she had only spoken out – then – at once.’

He said: ‘Tell me again her exact words.’

I repeated them.

‘She saw how someone could have come in from outside without any of you knowing? Come, ma soeur, let us go up to the roof and you shall show me just where she was standing.’

We went up to the roof together and I showed Poirot the exact spot where Miss Johnson had stood.

‘Like this?’ said Poirot. ‘Now what do I see? I see half the courtyard – and the archway – and the doors of the drawing-office and the photographic-room and the laboratory. Was there anyone in the courtyard?’

‘Father Lavigny was just going towards the archway and Mr Reiter was standing in the door of the photographic-room.’

‘And still I do not see in the least how anyone could come in from outside and none of you know about it…But she saw…’

He gave it up at last, shaking his head.

‘Sacre nom d’un chien – va! What did she see?’

The sun was just rising. The whole eastern sky was a riot of rose and orange and pale, pearly grey.

‘What a beautiful sunrise!’ said Poirot gently.

The river wound away to our left and the Tell stood up outlined in gold colour. To the south were the blossoming trees and the peaceful cultivation. The water-wheel groaned in the distance – a faint unearthly sound. In the north were the slender minarets and the clustering fairy whiteness of Hassanieh.

It was incredibly beautiful.

And then, close at my elbow, I heard Poirot give a long deep sigh.

‘Fool that I have been,’ he murmured. ‘When the truth is so clear – so clear.’

Chapter 25. Suicide or Murder?

I hadn’t time to ask Poirot what he meant, for Captain Maitland was calling up to us and asking us to come down.

We hurried down the stairs.

‘Look here, Poirot,’ he said. ‘Here’s another complication. The monk fellow is missing.’

‘Father Lavigny?’

‘Yes. Nobody noticed it till just now. Then it dawned on somebody that he was the only one of the party not around, and we went to his room. His bed’s not been slept in and there’s no sign of him.’